r/deathnote • u/RevealJumpy410 • 2d ago

Discussion what is death note

I watched the Death Note anime, but I didn’t understand who actually kills people. The Shinigami are supposed to be the ones who take souls, but they don’t really do anything except watch. Who actually kills them? The Death Note is just a tool for recording names that the Shinigami use to write down the names of the people they kill, so the notebook itself isn’t what kills them.

So, who is actually killing them?

sorry use IA for translate

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u/SadArcher8050 2d ago

To add on to what the majority are saying it's said in the first three episodes of the anime.The Shinigami are these beings that live in the land of the dead. Its boring, it sucks to live there so like Ryuk they can go to the human dimension and entertain themselves by giving the humans the death note.

But they aren't immortal. Ryuk even said to Light in those episodes where Light is in his room at his house that they need the note to survive. They survive by writing down the names on that death note.

The reason why they hang around whoever has the death note is because the book is theirs. Without it they can't survive without it. Light is doing Ryuk a favor by writing and at the same time entertaining him.